1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an α-agarase and a method for producing the same. Specifically, the present invention relates to an α-agarase, which is useful for producing agarooligosaccharides with low degrees of polymerization having various physiological activities from agarose, and a method for producing the α-agarase as well as use of the enzyme. The present invention also relates to a polypeptide having an α-agarase activity and a gene encoding said polypeptide. Specifically, the present invention relates to an amino acid sequence of an α-agarase, which is useful for producing agarooligosaccharides with low degrees of polymerization having various physiological activities from agarose, and a nucleotide sequence encoding the amino acid sequence. Furthermore, the present invention relates to a method for producing a polypeptide having an α-agarase activity by genetic engineering. In addition, the present invention relates to a method for producing an agarooligosaccharide using a polypeptide having an α-agarase activity.
2. Description of Related Art
Agarose is the principal constituent of agar. Agarose is a polysaccharide that has a structure in which D-galactose and 3,6-anhydro-L-galactose are alternately linked together through α-1,3 bonds and β-1,4 bonds. One must degrade agarose into smaller molecules in order to produce oligosacchaides from agar. For this purpose, methods in which agarose is chemically degraded and methods in which agarose is enzymatically digested are known. In a chemical degradation method, agarose can be hydrolyzed using an acid. In this case, α-1,3 bonds are mainly cleaved. Two enzymes, β-agarase which cleaves β-1,4 bonds in agarose and α-agarase which cleaves α-1,3 bonds in agarose, are known to digest agarose.
Oligosaccharides obtained by cleaving agarose at β-1,4 bonds are called as neoagarooligosaccharides. Neoagarooligosaccharides have D-galactose at their reducing ends and their degrees of polymerization are expressed by even numbers. On the other hand, oligosaccharides obtained by cleaving agarose at α-1,3 bonds are called as agarooligosaccharides. Agarooligosaccharides have 3,6-anhydro-L-galactose at their reducing ends and their degrees of polymerization are expressed by even numbers. Recently, it was shown that agarooligosaccharides which have 3,6-anhydro-L-galactose at their reducing ends have physiological activities such as an apoptosis-inducing activity, a carcinostatic activity, various antioxidant activities, an immunoregulatory activity, an antiallergic activity, an anti-inflammatory activity and an activity of inhibiting α-glycosidase (WO99/24447, Japanese Patent Application No. 11-11646). Based on the physiological activities, pharmaceutical compositions and functional foods or drinks containing the agarooligosaccharides as their active ingredients can be provided.
It is difficult to control the size of produced oligosaccharides in a method in which agarose is chemically degraded. In particular, it is quite difficult to selectively produce smaller oligosaccharides with low degrees of polymerization (e.g., T. Tokunaga et al., Bioscience & Industry, 49:734 (1991)). If β-agarase is used, only neoagarooligosaccharides which do not have the above-mentioned physiological activities can be obtained because this enzyme cleaves only β-1,4 bonds.
It is expected that agarooligosaccharides having physiological activities are produced by using α-agarase which has an activity of cleaving α-1,3 bonds. Known α-agarases include enzymes produced by a marine Gram-negative bacterial strain GJ1B (Carbohydrate Research, 66:207–212 (1978); this strain is indicated as Alteromonas agarlyticus strain GJ1B in European Journal of Biochemistry, 214:599–607 (1993)) and a bacterium of genus Vibrio (JP-A 7-322878; strain JT0107-L4). However, it is impossible to produce agarobiose which has notable physiological activities by using the α-agarase derived from Alteromonas agarlyticus strain GJ1B because the enzyme cannot digest hexasaccharides or shorter oligosaccharides. Furthermore, the α-agarase derived from a bacterium of genus Vibrio cannot be used for the production of agarooligosaccharides using agarose as a raw material because this enzyme exhibits its activity only on hexasaccharides and shorter oligosaccharides and does not act on agarose at all.
As described above, prior art has problems regarding the production of smaller agarooligosaccharides such as agarobiose and agarotetraose which have 3,6-anhydro-L-galactose at their reducing ends and have various physiological activities.
The main object of the present invention is to provide a polypeptide having an α-agarase activity which can be used for efficient production of smaller agarooligosaccharides, an amino acid sequence of the polypeptide, a gene encoding the polypeptide, a method for producing the polypeptide and a method for producing the smaller agarooligosaccharides.